Friday, March 3, 2017

*Mail Call* February 2017

February is over which means that it's time for the run-down of all the books that I got in the mail last month. I really intended to get this post put together on the 1st, but I've been busy working on other stuff that was slightly more important. I'm still supposed to be working on that stuff, but I'm taking a short break to work on this. So without further ado, here are the books I got in February.

The Rusted Sun by Michael Zimmer

Photo Credit: Goodreads

Synopsis

Half-frozen and nearly dead, Gil Ryan rode into the little mountain town of Larkspur just ahead of a raging late-winter blizzard. He’d lost everything he owned except for his mount and the clothes on his back when his pack horse fell through the ice on the Big Sandy River; racked with fever, early-stage pneumonia, and a barely healed gunshot wound, all he wanted was a little medicine and a warm place to wait out the storm. But Gil had no way of knowing the surrounding Ensillado Basin was about to be plunged into a range war, or that the man whose bullet he carried, the same professional killer who had murdered his brother the previous fall, was also in the Ensillado, leading an army of hired guns to rid the Basin of its homesteaders and small ranchers.

Even before he’s fully healed, Gil is mistaken for a member of the opposing side. Forced into a war he doesn’t want and feels ill-equipped to handle, he assembles a ragtag army of reluctant townspeople and local homesteaders and sets out to bring order to the town of Larkspur and the grass-rich basin surrounding it. But there’s more at play in the Ensillado than Gil originally realized. Soon he finds himself in the battle of his life, the stakes a kindly doctor’s loyalty, a widow’s promise of love, and a chance to bring his brother’s killer to justice … assuming the town doesn’t turn on him when the bullets start to fly.

This bleak appraisal was the response a young Michelle Mazal received when she first tried to tell her story to a relative. She, her three sisters and her mother lived for years under the shadow of her father's drunken violence and random sadism. All these years later, Mazal, a tough and compassionate survivor, is telling her story again; this time someone must listen.

In her powerful and evocative memoir, Mazal pieces together fragments of a life that convey both a child's love for her father and an adult's understanding of domestic violence. Memories of playing with her sisters, getting her teeth pulled out and riding her much-loved horses are undercut by moments of daily, normalised horror. Mazal captures the complexities of her dysfunctional family in an honest, open-hearted and insightful way. She knows, none better, that feelings of love, hate, security and fear nestle more closely together than we would like to acknowledge, and that the people we love can sometimes be the ones who hurt us the most.

What is going on in your next-door neighbor's head? Jonathan Miller knows. In Alone Again, Miller's second book of short stories, simple, precise language is used to convey complex emotions. With clarity and patience, he provides a peek into the minds of people on the brink of decision. Sons, fathers, and husbands receive particular attention as Miller dissects the invisible worries and inscrutable choices that these men might scarcely acknowledge, even to themselves. These are not stories where things just happen to people; they are honest glimpses of people on the verge of making their own lives happen — for better or for worse.

Miller's first book of short stories, On Your Own, was published in 2015.

No matter who you are, no matter what you've been through, Grace Trail® will connect where you are now with where you want to go.

You can walk the trail anywhere, anytime, with anyone by just showing up and asking the questions shared in this book. Created by acclaimed life coach Anne Barry Jolles in 2012 to help her cope with the worry of having a son in combat in Afghanistan, Grace Trail has guided thousands of people to begin a simple conversation around joy, hope and resiliency.

Plymouth, MA is the site of the original, beloved path, but it is not the only one. Grace Trail can be walked anywhere, from the comfort of the reader's kitchen to the office or any outdoor spot. Filled with easy to implement ideas, inspirational anecdotes, humor, compassion and realistic optimism, this book offers readers practical, immediate tools to take "5 Steps Toward Your Best Life.®"

By asking and reflecting on key questions about the five components of GRACE - Gratitude, Release, Acceptance, Challenge and Embrace - you will find that you are walking off your worries and accessing hope. Move toward the life you were meant to live with Grace Trail.

Eating one’s own kind is completely natural behavior in thousands of species, including humans. Throughout history we have engaged in cannibalism for reasons of famine, burial rites, and medicinal remedies; it’s been used as a way to terrorize and even a way to show filial piety. With unexpected wit and a wealth of knowledge, American Museum of Natural History biologist Bill Schutt takes us on a tour of the field, dissecting exciting new research and investigating questions such as why so many fish eat their offspring and some amphibians consume their mother’s skin; why sexual cannibalism is an evolutionary advantage for certain spiders; why, until the end of the eighteenth century, British royalty ate human body parts; how cannibalism may be linked to the extinction of Neanderthals; why microbes on sacramental bread may have led Catholics to execute Jews in the Middle Ages.

Today, the subject of humans consuming one another has been relegated to the realm of horror movies, fiction, and the occasional psychopath, but be forewarned: As climate change progresses and humans see more famine, disease, and overcrowding, biological and cultural constraints may well disappear. These are the very factors that lead to outbreaks of cannibalism. As he examines these close encounters of the cannibal kind, Bill Schutt makes the ick-factor fascinating.

12 years after surviving horrific massacre, 15-year- old Meho commits ruthless murders and sets in motion the event which could change the world order.

The murders are followed by the trial of the century, where media vilifies Meho as a psychopath, mass murderer, and a monster — all under the influence of FBI, who are trying to conceal the identity of the victims and protect the National Security.

The only person who believes that Meho is innocent is his 10-year-old brother Bucky, who will turn heavens and earth to free Meho. After learning the truth, Bucky is devastated, but not all things are as they seem, and the truth will be revealed at the very end.

When fifteen-year-old Lucy Willows discovers that her father has a child from a brief affair, a eight-year-old boy named Thomas who lives in her own suburban New Jersey town, she begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her family and her life. Lucy can’t believe her father betrayed the whole family, or that her mother forgave him, or that her sister isn’t rocked by the news the way Lucy is. Worse, Lucy’s father’s secret is now her own, one that isolates her from her friends, family, and even her boyfriend, Simon, the one person she expected would truly understand. When Lucy escapes to Maine, the home of her mysteriously estranged grandfather, she finally begins to get to the bottom of her family’s secrets and lies.

A heartbreaking, unforgettable portrait of country music’s founding father and “Hillbilly King.”

After he died in the backseat of a Cadillac at the age of twenty-nine, Hank Williams—a frail, flawed man who had become country music’s first real star—instantly morphed into its first tragic martyr. Having hit the heights with simple songs of despair, depression, and tainted love, he would, with that outlaw swagger, become in death a template for the rock generation to follow. Six decades later, Mark Ribowsky now weaves together the first fully realized biography of Hank Williams in a generation. Examining his music while also re-creating days and nights choked in booze and desperation, Ribowsky traces the miraculous rise of this music legend—from the dirt roads of rural Alabama to the now-immortal stage of the Grand Ole Opry, and finally to a sad, lonely end on New Year’s Day, 1953. The result is an original work that promises to uncover the real Hank beneath the myths that have long enshrouded his legacy.

Our bodies started shaking from the cold and shock, yet we were so terrified of being caught that we had to keep our teeth clenched together to keep them from chattering; we could not allow ourselves to make any sound. Whenever we heard a sound or detected motion, we would stare in that direction, even though we could see nothing but dark. Dawit Gebremichael Habte fled his homeland of Eritrea as a teenager. In the midst of the ongoing Eritrean-Ethiopian war, Dawit and his sisters crossed illegally into Kenya. Without their parents or documents to help their passage, they experienced the abuse and neglect known by so many refugees around the world.

But Dawit refused to give up. He stayed resilient and positive. Journeying to the United States under asylum and still a boy Dawit found a new purpose in an unfamiliar land. Against impossible odds, he studied hard and was accepted to Johns Hopkins University, eventually landing a job as a software engineer at Bloomberg. After a few years, with the support of Michael Bloomberg himself, Dawit returned to his homeland to offer business opportunities for other Eritreans. Dawit found a way to help his ancestral land emerge from thirty years of debilitating war.

Gratitude in Low Voices is about how one man was marginalized, but how compassion and love never abandoned him. It s about learning how to care for family, and how to honor those who help the helpless. The life of a refugee is hard, and the lives of those in war-torn lands are harder still. This account reminds us that hope is not lost.

This humble story of Dawit s life stands out in a time when we look at immigrants as never before a book that illuminates our decisions to help or to turn away those who land on our doorstep, and the gratitude that surely follows any act of compassion."

Breastfeeding. The mere mention of it has many mothers wracked with anxiety (how will I manage with work, other kids, what if I don't make enough milk?) or guilt about not doing it (will I be hurting my child if I choose not to breastfeed? what will people think of me if I choose not to?). This hot-button issue is one we've talked about repeatedly in the media and in celebrity culture. Remember when Angelina Jolie posed for the cover of W nursing her newborn? Oh, the controversy! And when Barbara Walters complained about the woman breastfeeding next to her on a plane? She was forced to issue a public apology. Or what about when supermodel Gisele Bunchen declared that there should be worldwide law that mothers be required to breastfeed their babies for the first six months of life? All hell broke loose.

This topic gets people riled up, and there has never been a narrative account that explores the breastfeeding big picture for parents and their children in today's world. THE BIG LETDOWN by author, journalist, and breastfeeding advocate Kimberly Seals Allers will change that for the better and open up a candid conversation about the cultural, sociological, and economic forces that shape the breastfeeding culture and how it undermines women in the process.

Best friends Grace and Miranda, good Catholic girls of a certain age, find themselves at odds with their ‘saintly’ husbands after decades of marriage. Grace plots an escape from her well-meaning but overbearing husband, while Miranda struggles with a spike in libido and a disinterested spouse. But their husbands, former seminary classmates, have their own devils to deal with: Fulton fights his attraction to a flighty younger woman and his own (unfounded) fears that Grace is developing dementia; while Sal contends with ‘performance issues’ and the sudden appearance of Miranda’s ‘starter’ husband, a man he didn’t even know existed. At stake are two marriages and four distinct friendships, and the tools at hand include humor, enduring love, a little faith and lots of chocolate.

In high school, Naomi Brooks had a major crush on Lucius Knight—much like every other girl. So it's oh-so-satisfying to have the sexy corporate raider eager to buy her organic-products company years later. This man doesn't know how to lose. And he's making it clear that he wants Naomi's business as well as her body…

Even when Naomi was a rough-and-tumble tomboy, Lucius was drawn to her. Now that she's bold, sexy and confident, she's even more alluring. He's willing to play dirty to convince her that a liaison can be mutually beneficial in and out of the bedroom. But that gamble, and an explosive family secret, might cost him the only conquest that truly matters: her heart.

For fans of Orphan Train and Water for Elephants, a compelling historical novel from “one of the best authors of women’s fiction” (Library Journal). Set against the turbulent backdrop of American Vaudeville, four sisters embark on an unexpected adventure—and a last-ditch effort to save their family.

It’s 1919, and the Turners are barely scraping by. When their father loses his job, their irrepressible mother decides that vaudeville is their best chance to make the rent—and create a more exciting life for herself in the process.

Traveling by train from town to town, teenagers Gert, Winnie, and Kit, and recent widow Nell soon find a new kind of freedom in the company of performers who are as diverse as their acts. There is a seamier side to the business, however, and the young women face dangers and turns of fate they never could have anticipated. Heartwarming and surprising, The Tumbling Turner Sisters is ultimately a story of awakening—to unexpected possibilities, to love and heartbreak, and to the dawn of a new American era.

Where do the unrighteous go after death? What is the plight of the guilty after the Day of Judgment? Are places like heaven, hell, and the lake of fire physical locations in the universe? Biblically based and scientifically reasoned answers to these questions, and more, lead to locating the planet Venus as one possible place for perdition.

The book Venus: Don’t Go There—What Science and Religion Reveal about Life after Death reviews past and present discoveries and provides future evidence for alliance between the physical sciences and the Bible. God ordained the sciences and religion to work together for the common good and to lead toward a comprehensive understanding of the future.

Correlation between the Holy Scriptures and the sciences can work together to provide reasonable and meaningful truths. Through interdisciplinary study, the author deduces the ultimate destiny for unsaved humanity could be within the solar system, while providing a unique perspective to life after death.

The third book in the sexy Sinful Suitors Regency romance series, this heart-pounding story shows why New York Timesbestselling author Sabrina Jeffries is one of the most beloved historical romance writers today.

To root out the card cheat responsible for her brother’s death, Miss Delia Trevor spends her evenings dancing her way through high society balls, and her late nights disguised as a young man gambling her way through London’s gaming hells. Then one night, handsome Warren Corry, the Marquess of Knightford, a notorious member of St. George’s Club, recognizes her. When he threatens to reveal her secret, she’s determined to keep him from ruining her plans, even if it means playing a cat-and-mouse game with the enigmatic rakehell.

Warren knows the danger of her game, and he refuses to watch her lose everything while gaining justice for her late brother. But when she starts to delve beneath his carefully crafted façade, can he keep her at arm’s length while still protecting her? Or will their hot desires explode into a love that transcends the secrets of their pasts?

The Crenshaw Six are a small but up-and-coming gang in South Central LA who have recently been drawn into an escalating war between rival drug cartels. To outsiders, the Crenshaw Six appear to be led by a man named Garcia . . . but what no one has figured out is that the gang's real leader (and secret weapon) is Garcia's girlfriend, a brilliant young woman named Lola.

Lola has mastered playing the role of submissive girlfriend, and in the man's world she inhabits she is consistently underestimated. But in truth she is much, much smarter--and in many ways tougher and more ruthless--than any of the men around her, and as the gang is increasingly sucked into a world of high-stakes betrayal and brutal violence, her skills and leadership become their only hope of survival.

An astonishing debut crime thriller about an unforgettable woman who combines the genius and ferocity of Lisbeth Salander with the ruthless ambition of Walter White. Lola marksthe debut of a hugely exciting new thriller writer, and of a singular, magnificent character unlike anyone else in fiction.

In The Art of Healthy Living, author Homayoun Sadeghi, MD, draws from his personal experience and practice as a physician to highlight the delicate, interconnected nature of the mind and the body. He describes how the mind plays an intimate role in balancing and maintaining the body, and that understanding this relationship is essential to achieving a strong, fit, and healthy body.

People of all ages and walks of life have drawn inspiration and insight from Dr. Sadeghi’s knowledge and unique perspective about health, happiness, and inner vitality. In this thought-provoking book, he cracks open a world of wisdom that lays the foundation for a healthy and vibrant life.

In chapters like “The Virtual Nature of the Universe,” “The Riddle of Disease and Illness,” and “The Age Old Secrets of Healthy Living,” this compelling book inspires a culture of health and vitality based on reliance on instinct, intuition and inner guidance. This book encourages the reader to look inward to rediscover and reestablish the wisdom that lies within.

Dr. Sadeghi explains how health takes effort, and that this effort starts from the inside out. He describes how a consistent source of harmony, energy, and vitality must by necessity take root from the inside out.

Detective Denise Aragon can't trust her witness, the one who hasn't been killed yet. She can't trust Judge Judy Diaz and her sociopathic attorney girlfriend. She can't trust her FBI agent lover, but she's going to take a bullet for him anyway.

While Aragon struggles, the secret patrón who rules Santa Fe's south side and his bloodthirsty twin brother are compromising everybody to cash out a fraudulent, multi-million dollar verdict. Blackmail or assassination, it makes no difference. They want their money fast.

Continuing the story that began with The Drum Within—heralded as "a masterpiece" by #1 New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni—Compromised is a tour de force of suspenseful storytelling.

Troubling the Ashes is a work of historical fiction set in the turbulent 1960s when the integration of schools was bringing out the worst in people. The book's narrator, Marley Jane, and her family are living through the aftermath of a school burned to the ground by an unknown perpetrator in a small, Alabama town divided by hate. Based on actual events, likely unknown to the average reader, Troubling the Ashes is a story that needs to be told, and Aaron's passion in telling it is palpable.

In Book 2 of Healing Wisdom for a Wounded World, Weam Namou takes you through the second year of her apprenticeship in Lynn Andrews’ four-year shamanic school.

Join her as she embarks on a deep transformation process. The school’s focus for this year is to understand how to bring form into the world; to experience holding energy and moving it out into the universe; to develop the ability to move energy into objects for healing and sacred work; to learn how to use sacred tools in a powerful way without manipulating ourselves or others; and to prepare for the building of dream bodies and develop the skills for lucid dreaming.

Once again, throughout Namou’s journey, you will find yourself in each page of this book as you witness how ancient teachings helped transform the life of a twenty-first century writer, wife, and mother.

This is the third edition to the Heal With Me series. It started as Inspiration Needed…A Book of Poems in 1997; to Heal With Me, and Our Journey Goes On in 1999, and 2001. These books have been a source of inspiration in various schools, organizations, and societies across Canada, and as well as in different households; I hope they will generate the same feelings this time around.

This novel is an exciting college romance about best buddies, fraternity parties, new experiences and dangerous secrets. Colin and Karl are best friends and college sophomores enjoying an adventurous social life at a preppy, upstate New York college.

However, when Colin meets green eyed Jasmine everything in his life is soon turned upside down. The red-hot romance between gorgeous Jasmine from Laguna Beach, California and handsome Colin from New York City will keep you turning the pages.

Colin Preston Rocked And Rolled is written for readers 18 and older. The book will take you back to college again and allow you to once again experience all the highs and lows of first love.

And that wraps up the books that I got in the mail in February. I'm most excited to read The Big Letdown, Cannibalism, and Lola. Which of these books are you most interested in reading my review of? - Katie